National Union Party of Costa Rica

The National Union Party (PUN) is a liberal-conservative political party in Costa Rica which was founded in 1901 by Ascension Esquivel Ibarra. Ibarra, like the other political elites at the time, was liberal, and the party's annulled victory in the 1948 presidential election led to the short-lived Costa Rican Civil War. Otilio Ulate Blanco, the PUN leader, won the civil war and became President, and the party would ally with the National Republican Party (its former enemy) against the National Liberation Party. After the 1966 presidential election, the PUN's power diminished, never achieving power again. During the 2000s, the party became more conservative and Christian democratic.